The present invention relates to apparatus for and methods of providing a visual performance guide display to assist in a manual performance, and more particularly to an apparatus and method which, in an automatic performance device of electronic musical instruments etc., visually indicate keys to be depressed as a music performance progresses in accordance with prestored automatic performance data.
Electronic musical instruments equipped with a performance assisting function (hereinafter also called performance-assisting electronic musical instruments) have been known, where a plurality of LEDs are provided near and in corresponding relation to individual keys so that particular LEDs associated with the keys corresponding to tone pitch data (key numbers) contained in automatic performance data are sequentially turned on or illuminated in accordance with progression of a background automatic performance to visually guide a human player in a manual performance. However, the performance-assisting electronic musical instruments so far proposed can set only one transposition for the entire tone data processing system thereof, and thus they always apply a same or common transposition to both the manual performance on the keyboard and the automatic performance. Because only the same transposition is applied to both the manual performance on the keyboard and the automatic performance, the LEDs to be illuminated for a visual key depression guide need not differ between the manual performance and the automatic performance and the LEDs to be illuminated after the transposition are the same as those before the transposition. For this reason, the conventional performance-assisting electronic musical instruments only permit practice on a keyboard performance corresponding only to a particular musical key of the automatic performance data. Thus, when a user desires to practice a keyboard performance corresponding to a different musical key than that of the automatic performance data (i.e., when the user desires to practice a keyboard performance with the different musical key just as with a natural musical instrument such as a piano), there arises a need to edit the pre-recorded automatic performance data so as to conform to the different or user-desired key, and the editing operations are very cumbersome and time-consuming.
Pre-recording automatic performance data corresponding to a variety of musical keys may be one possible approach to practice on a keyboard performance corresponding to a desired musical key other than that of the automatic performance data. However, with this approach, many sets of automatic performance data have to be pre-recorded per music piece in correspondence with the various musical keys, which would unavoidably waste data storage areas of limited capacity.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus and method which, in an application where keys to be depressed are guided in accordance with progression of a music piece performed automatically or otherwise, e.g., where keys to be depressed are visually indicated by illuminating LEDs located near the keys in corresponding relation thereto, permit appropriate illumination of the keys in correspondence with any transposition applied to the music piece.
In order to accomplish the above-mentioned object, the present invention provides a performance assisting apparatus for receiving automatic performance data and causing a performance guide device to provide a guide to a manual performance on the basis of the received automatic performance data, which comprise: a transposition setting device adapted to set a transposition value for the automatic performance data; and a processor coupled with the transposition setting device and the performance guide device, the processor being adapted to transpose the automatic performance data in accordance with the transposition value set by the transposition setting device and cause the performance guide device to provide a performance guide based on the transposed automatic performance data. In the performance assisting apparatus, the transposition value set by the transposition setting device is prevented from becoming effective or acting on a tone based on the manual performance.
According to the present invention thus arranged, the tone pitch designated by the automatic performance data is transposed (converted from one musical key to another) in accordance with the transposition value set by the transposition setting device, and the thus-transposed tone pitch is visually indicated by the performance guide device. Thus, by a human player manually operating particular ones of the performance operators on the keyboard as visually indicated by the performance guide device, there is achieved a manual performance with player""s operation corresponding to the transposition of the automatic performance data. Here, because the transposition value set by the transposition setting device is caused to not become effective or act on each tone based on the manual performance, the manually-performed tone is sounded with a pitch exactly as operated by the player (namely, the manually-performed tone is prevented from being automatically transposed), when a manual performance is executed with the operation corresponding to the transposition of the automatic performance data manipulation based on the transposition of the automatic performance data. This arrangement achieves a performance free of inconveniences. Namely, the present invention, on the basis of automatic performance data of a single music piece, permits a visual performance guide corresponding to any optional transposition of the automatic performance data. More specifically, the present invention achieves a performance assisting apparatus which can appropriately deal with a variety of transposition with utmost ease (i.e., time and labor involved in editing can be minimized because it is only necessary to set a transposition value by means of the transposition setting device) and a simplified structure and without a need to edit and store many sets of the automatic performance data of the single music piece in correspondence with different musical keys.
Further, according to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a music performance apparatus which comprises: a plurality of performance operators corresponding to a plurality of tone pitches; a performance guide device adapted to provide a performance guide display for indicating which of the performance operators is to be operated; a performance data supplying device adapted to supply performance data of an optionally selected music piece, the performance data containing at least tone pitch information; a transposition setting device adapted to set a transposition value for the performance data; a processor coupled with at least the performance guide device, the performance supplying device and the transposition setting device, the processor being adapted to transpose the performance data by controlling the tone pitch information in accordance with the transposition value set by the transposition setting device and cause the performance guide device to provide the performance guide display based on the controlled tone pitch information; and a tone generator device adapted to generate a tone at least in response to operation of any of the performance operators. In the music performance apparatus, the transposition value set by the transposition setting device is not applied to a tone that is to be generated via the tone generator device in response to the operation of the performance operator. In this case, a desired transposition can be imparted only to the performance guide display in the same manner as mentioned above, so that the same advantageous benefits and objects as above are achieved.
The music performance apparatus may further comprise a general transposition setting device adapted to set a general transposition value, and the pitch of the tone to be generated via the tone generator device in response to the operation of the performance operator may be controlled in accordance with the general transposition value set by the general transposition setting device. With this arrangement, it is only necessary that a desired transposition amount, with which the player wants to practice using the performance guide function, be set directly by the transposition setting device for the performance data, which greatly simplifies the necessary setting operations and makes it very easy to determine an amount or degree of transposition that should be set for a manual performance assisted by the performance guide function. Then, if an automatic performance tone corresponding to the performance data is to be generated, it is desirable that the transposition by the general transposition setting device act on the automatic performance tone. This is because the tone manually performed in accordance with the performance guide display is transposed by the general transposition setting device and hence it is desirable to transpose the automatic performance tone in conformity with the transposed manually-performed tone. Therefore, in this case, the pitch of the automatic performance tone is better controlled in accordance with a combination of the transposition values set by both the transposition setting device for the performance data and the general transposition setting device.
It should be noted that the terms xe2x80x9cmanual performancexe2x80x9d as used in the context of the present invention refer not only to a form of performance executed by operating performance operators of a keyboard or the like with a human player""s hand but also to other forms of performance executed using a player""s foot or other part of his or her body.
The present invention may be implemented not only as the apparatus invention but also as a method invention. The present invention may also be practiced as a program for execution by a processor, such as a CPU or DSP, and as a medium storing such a program.